2018 Yamaha Boats 212 Limited S — Pewaukee, WI 53072

A 2018 Yamaha 212 Limited S at Pewaukee, Wisconsin, asking $39,995 through SkipperBud's Pewaukee. This is the shelf's heretic: no propeller at all. Twin 1.8-litre Yamaha marine engines feed two jet pumps, good for 51.8 mph flat out, and an articulating keel keeps the hull tracking straight at tow speeds — Yamaha's answer to the wander that rudderless jet boats were famous for. It listed at $53,399 new, so seven seasons have taken $13,404 off the sticker of a boat whose engines are the same 1.8s Yamaha has been refusing to let die in WaveRunners for years.

The case for it as the family tow vehicle is real. Owners report more than enough low-end torque for boards and tubes with five aboard, the tower is standard on the Limited S, the draft is shallow enough for sandbars that swallow V-drives, and there is no spinning metal anywhere near a swim platform full of children — the single best safety argument in this category.

The case against is the wake, and it should be weighed honestly. Jet outflow churns the water: the wake behind a 212 is washier and choppier than behind any inboard, fine for tubes and learning boarders, thin for anyone chasing air. Surfing is possible — jets make it safe where props forbid it — but only modest, and only with an aftermarket shaper like the Wake Wedge doing the sculpting. Add the breed's known quirks: louder at idle than buyers expect (insulation improved in later years; the character remains), a learning curve at the dock where there is no rudder bite, and pumps that will happily inhale a rope or the wrong lake's debris. The impeller hatch exists because it gets used.

Where it sits on the ladder is precise. For $4,995 less, the 2005 Air Nautique 226 makes the wake this boat cannot, at the cost of thirteen more years and a propeller:

For $7,500 less, the Monterey M-225 is the prop-driven deck boat that matches this boat's social ambitions and abandons its sporting ones:

And for $5 more — genuinely, five dollars — the Centurion Enzo SV240 is the opposite philosophy in full: eleven years older, a legend's hull, a real wave:

The full argument between props and pumps plays out across the powerboat shelf. If your water is shallow, your crew is young, and the wake is a means rather than the point, this is the modern answer — survey it first:

Sources: boats.com review of the Yamaha 21-series sportboat; BoatTEST on the 212 Limited S; JetBoaters.net owner threads on towing, noise and wake shapers; published 2018 MSRP figures.